A/N: Hello! This is my first attempt at writing a Loki centered fanfic. I have plenty of other ideas for fics but I am sliiightly insecure and I wanna see how this one goes. Hopefully you enjoy!

Chapter One:

"Oh it's you. Hello, Sif. Look at what I just-"

"Thor. He's gone."

"What-"

"He's run off again... And Thor. I think this is it. I think this time it's for good."

A letter addressed to no one.

Don't look for me. I tried but I just couldn't do Just believe that wherever I am that I am doing well. You can tell them all that I died in some unfortunate event or that I never existed at all- just do not come after me.

I'm sorry. Do not look for me. Please do not look for me.

Be happy. I'm sorry for all the pain I have caused. I'm sorry about Mother.

-Loki

He tried. He tried so damn hard. How could he tell them that without receiving a smothering, patronizing "I know how you feel" speech?

(Thor)

Or a scoff?

(Sif)

Or gazes that would just look away, self-embarrassed?

(Fandral)

(Hogun)

(Volstagg)

Or the one gaze that could shatter his resolve beyond repair and make Loki want to hide before he saw the indifferent depth in his eye, replaced by the view of his back?

(Father)

(Odin)

Odin would turn away. He knew it. He has witnessed it happen before.

(No, Loki)

So he ran. Left behind a letter because he couldn't leave them all a better him.

A prince who could stand to walk on his own through the halls and handle weapons in the Training Room without twenty different pairs of eyes turning to watch him, waiting for him to sink a blade deep into his wrists.

A prince who could sit in the Dining Room and laugh and eat and boast stories of hunting adventures and grand battles instead of twenty different pairs of eyes to turn and stare at his near-empty plate and compel him with their steel eyes to fill the hollows between his protruding ribs.

A prince who could walk into a room recieving hellos instead of glares, people bowing their heads repectively instead of scanning the scars down the length of his too-thin arms. A prince who could fill the room with greetings and laughs instead of painful silences and unspoken accusations.

A little brother who could give his older brother more than the sympathetic glances of strangers. A friend who could remember to smile in all the right places instead of filling the gaps in conversation like it was an obligation.

(what a pretty lie that would be)

(But you have told it before, haven't you?)

You have destroyed this family, Odin said when he saw the angry slashes on his arms.

He did not shout. Merely stated it as if it were as factual and insignificant as the weather.

Did you hear about the prince? They all whisper. Is it true what they say?

Is it true he's insane?

He runs through miles of biting forest. The branches snatch at his hair and clothes, trying to chain him here. They leave angry red marks to remind him of the ones that came before.

His scars tingle.

He slipped off the slimy feel of Heimdall's forever watching gaze with a tricky spell. So many months of making sure that the youngest prince of Asgard did not stray from the encaging walls of Asgard's palace. Making sure that Loki did not wander off too far away from Thor or Sif, ascertaining that every blade was accounted for at the end of the day, that every bath Loki took was exactly ten minutes, like clockwork.

(not enough time to bleed out)

(not enough time to drown oneself either)

(at least without being caught)

As if the ever present stares from Asgard's townspeople weren't enough, he had to deal with subjecting Heimdall to a demotation from Guardian of the Worlds to babysitter for a certain mentally unstable prince.

There is a phrase that mortals use for disorders such as these, Allfather, Eir said.They call it manic depression. That, along with him not eating and his self-destructive behavior...

Well... it's not a question of if, but when.

Odin blinked. Why has Asgard never dealt with cases such as these before?

Eir sighed. Mortals and... those of lesser advanced realms are commonly afflicted by ailments such as these. Ailments of the mind that Asgard has long since progressed past.

The room was silent.

(nobody spoke aloud what everyone was thinking)

His breaths come hard in the winter chill. He convinced himself before he ran that the darkness of the night would feel like a cloak, safely draped across his shoulders to hide him from view, lest they come running after him. Now he feels horribly constricted- as if the darkness is choking him. The starlight shines down bright and illuminates his pale skin.

(that too was always different, wasn't it?)

His pallor shines like a beacon in the middle of tangled branches, signaling to all of the suspiciously shaped shadows his exact location. He imagines them coming alive to rip out his throat.

He feels like a little boy again, when he was lost for hours and hours on end until night came along with all its shadowy friends with beady eyes and scissory claws. The shadows came alive and paralyzed him with terror until they finally heard his screaming and found him.

He almost calls for Thor like he did then too, before he chokes it down.

(remember yourself, Laufeyson.)

You are to stay with him at all times, Odin said.

He will sleep in your chambers. You will wait ten minutes outside the door every night in the Bathing Rooms. You will be his shadow, Odin told Thor.

You will accompany him every time that Thor is not. Escort him to the Dining Hall. To the Training Room. You understand how imperative it is to have your eyes on Loki at all times when you are in these places, Odin told Sif.

Keep an eye on him. Make certain he does not set foot outside of the palace, Odin told Heimdall.

Loki must not be left alone, Odin told them all.

He listened outside of the door. Peered through the crack. He saw the glance Thor and Sif exchanged. The look of astonished grief he mistook for exasperation.

(You will be his shadow.)

(Well, that's changing things up a bit, isn't it?)

Where can he go?

Not Jotunheim, Loki knows. Definitely not there. He would rather feel the demanding agony of the flames of Muspelheim before he feels the chill of his true birth land again.

(and his arm turned blue at the touch of the monster and he could not help but think Oh...)

(It all makes sense now.)

Fleetingly, he pictures the image of another forest, softer and full of light, where just below a cliff's edge of a foilage lies a small town glittering with artificial light.

What is that, Papa? Loki breathed.

Odin's eye looked down and twinkled. Light, he said simply. Mortals create their light through tiny spurts of electricity, much like lightning.

Like Mjolnir! Thor shouted, grinning.

Odin chuckled. Yes, like Mjolnir. Though quite not the same as you think, my son.

Loki could not take his eyes off them. The sparkling bulbs would resemble stars, if they weren't so close to the ground.

Midgard, he breathes. Midgard.

If he wasn't so breathless and terrified, he would laugh at the sheer irony of it all. The idea is so ridiculously ludicrous, so laughably, stupidly unexpected- to go to the very place that a mere two years ago he tried to subjugate- that got him the label of mentally incompetent in the first place-and seek refuge.

It is so unlikely that immediately- Loki knows it is the perfect place to go.

He stumbles for a second on a protruding stump of a tree and stops- cursing and holding his foot- when he hears them.

The branches snap a mere distance away. Loki freezes- straining to hear past the distracting sounds of insects and rushing water nearby.

Then- they start calling his name.

"Loki! Loki! LOKI!"

They are searching for him. Obviously, his pleas in his letter to be left alone have been ignored. He honestly shouldn't feel surprised over this and he hates himself for being so.

"LOKI!"

He runs faster but quieter. His too-thin limbs ache with the strain and already, even in the dark, he can see the black spots cover the edge of his vision. He cannot risk blacking out now- not when they lurk so close behind. But if he doesn't run faster, they will catch him. There is not much of a choice so he wills himself to stay upright and forces his limbs to move on, one step after the other.

"LOKI!"

Does he imagine it or do some call halfheartedly, like they want him to stay lost so they will never again have to deal with the consequences of him being found?

"LOKI!"

Inexplicably, names emerge from the voices. A face with rugged features and a warm smile. A woman's scowling face and watchful eyes.

Thor and Sif call the loudest.

(where's Odin?)

(was it not he who found you when you were just a child at play in the night?)

He imagines his starved legs snapping like kindling. He imagines his rib cage caving in on itself from his heaving gasps of air. He imagines the pathetically small heap of bloody remains his body would make. Even the rabid wolves would turn away in disgust.

He imagines his skeleton body falling to the leaves that litter the ground like crumpled paper drawings a child would make. His arms pump hard at his sides as he runs and gasps for air and he imagines how easy it would be to let them fall, to let his body just give in to the shadows and sleep forever.

But the thought of his ghost weight, the dangerously thin limbs splayed out in every direction stops him. The thought of Odin's embarrassed face as he would look upon his too-thin too-small too-frail too-weak despicably weak runt of a son makes him keep going. The thought of Thor's bulky, strong arms cradling his starved corpse makes him push on because he cannot be held in those arms that would look bigger than his entire body. He cannot bear to think of Odin poking his scarred, emaciated arms and saying He was not enough. There was not enough of him.

He was never enough of anything, not even himself. He was never enough.

What reason do I have to try? Loki asked in a half state of consciousness, numbed and rendered incapacitated from the medication and spells Eir was running through his blood.

Sif turned from her bedside vigil. Her presence confused him more than anything. Honor and duty bound her to watch over him by the Allfather's orders and make certain her prince did not do anything absurdly stupid, like launch himself off Bifrost. It did not bind her to stay by his bedside as he mumbled and cried out incoherently, as if she was loyally accompanying an old friend instead of admitting they were anything other than enemies who loathed and betrayed each other one too many times.

Sif said nothing but a soothing "shh" that was unfitting with the hostile scorn Loki associated with her in his mind. And then after a moment- Sif placed her hand over Loki's chest, where his heart beat falteringly.

It did not feel like a gesture of constraint or of comfort- but rather like an answer to his question.

What reason do I have to try?

He wanted to scoff and shove her hand off. Instead he passed out. Such sentiments are not reserved for monsters.

He knows where it is. He knows where to go.

If anyone had been paying any attention to him (the kind that mattered) they would have noticed something was off.

Not big noticeable things- but small, insignificant tidbits that made all the difference.

He is getting better, Thor told Odin.

Look at how he fills his plates all on his own. Look at how he can bathe himself. Look at how straight he sits, how unflinching he is when he passes by metal.

Did they really underestimate the God of Lies once more? Was their arrogance so great and pompous that they thought him docile and compliant as he used to be?

Yet Loki played along. Ate all of the food on his plate. Did not hide blades beneath his mattress. Hovered close to Sif when they were at each others' throats and didn't try to run. Nodded his head to Thor's constant reassurances and his idiotic good-natured advice.

Sit. Roll over. Good boy.

In return, Thor and Sif let loose the chain around his neck ever so slightly. It was all that he needed to slip out of the collar.

Loki can hear the pounding roar of water ahead. The sound of the waterfall masks his footsteps slightly so he allows himself to move a little quicker. He can taste blood in his mouth from the strain. His lungs ache.

One step. Another. Keep going. Do not stop.

He is almost there.

Ahead, he knows where it will be. The little sliver on the side of a cliff that leads to a cave. Inside that cave will not be hollow space- but a passage.

A secret pathway. A thread between the worlds. A very particular thread that connects to Midgard.

He spies the cliff ahead, the sudden end of thick forest that leads to a clearing overlooking the majestic view of Asgard's towering mountains in the distance, the land between forest and mountain churning with water below.

Rain starts to fall- harsh and unforgivably cold. Loki glances back- he wishes Thor would stop despairing.

(Be happy, he wrote.)

(Like you once were when I was the shadow)

Loki's small hand pointed to an ancient drawing on the page.

And that connects to... He furrowed his little eyebrows. Midgard?

Frigga threw her head back and laughed, the sound more musical than the tinkling patter of rain on the window. She squeezed him tighter than the book between them.

My child, she whispered, eyes twinkling. How clever you are.

She is gone now.

"LOKI!" Thor roars.

Above, lightning flashes. The crashing boom that follows shakes the ground between them and vibrates Loki's bones, his feet cradling the edge of the cliff and nearly losing his balance. He can hear the anguish of his brother's cries behind him but cannot tear his eyes from the churning water five hundred feet below.

Time stops.

The loutish footfalls of the search party finally stop. The wind eerily quiets down so Loki can hear in exquisite perfect detail the very moment Thor's heart shatters into a million pieces.

They freeze behind him- frightened that one move closer with compel Loki to jump.

He knows what this must look like- him standing on the edge of a precipice, arms held out slightly like he's tempted to launch himself off the cliff during that insane split second when nothing seems as appealing as jumping.

He never wanted this. He did not want Thor to come after him until it was too late. Did not want to hear Thor say with all the reason in the world that he was loved, that people waited for him, that he needed to come home. Just come home.

But don't they understand that he's not giving up?

(just giving in?)

He breathes deeply once and then turns away from the raging black water beneath. His eyes look through freezing droplets of rain and wind and dark air between them to lock eyes with his brother for reasons he cannot name.

(I can't do this anymore, Brother I cannot say it but I cannot do this anymore-)

Ahead is freedom, sweet and clear. Behind is pain and humiliation. But behind is also where Thor is.

But what if he didn't want to be like Thor anymore?

He breathes deeply. Looks ahead to the churning water below and wonders when his plan to leave to Midgard morphed into a plan of jumping to his death.

"Loki, no-" Thor begins.

And there it is. Loki smiles. He has heard those words before. He takes it as his cue.

"NO!" Thor shouts and the crack of thunder rips apart the air as Loki falls forward.

To be continued.

A/N: Please please please review if you have the time and let me know what you think!